


Twelve Days - Three (2 of 2)

by abbykrieger



Series: Twelve Days [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-27
Updated: 2013-12-27
Packaged: 2018-01-06 09:32:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1105223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abbykrieger/pseuds/abbykrieger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s - you can tell it without looking - not the kind of place where heads lie in the freezer and people shoot the walls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Twelve Days - Three (2 of 2)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bienfilatre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bienfilatre/gifts).



Sally won’t like it, but it’s better than the other way. John gets the chemical kit and the bag out of the car. Gives the door a slam, sighs, pulls the belt out of the way, slams it again, small mercy to find this time it’s closed. Heads up the walk.

“You.”  
“Rather it were him?”  
“No.”  
“Right then.”

She gives way and he bustles in, trying not to look around. The place smells of order and clean towels. It’s - you can tell it without looking - not the kind of place where heads lie in the freezer and people shoot the walls.  
Sally folds her arms as he opens the kit. “How is she? Do you know?”  
“Tubes came out this morning, breathing on her own. Not remembering much yet.” He looks up, and what he sees behind her is the glory wall. Diplomas, the certificates. Here was college. Here was joining the police force, making detective. Making the city safe. Here was her life before Sherlock and Watson, before consultancy and side-kickery showed up. “Your hands, please?” he asks.  
She complies immediately. Trained to follow orders. But not like him, like a soldier, without questions. “What are you looking for?”  
“Oh, who gives a crap?” He looks up to catch her face. “Trying to make you laugh.”  
She doesn’t, but it makes it easier to suffer the creepy gel he coats on her fingers, a cool slime rapidly hardening to grit.  
“It’s some insane thing. It sets in a minute, I peel it off, what transferred to your skin from the car and her clothes comes along. Why I was sent along with it. It’s idiot proof.”  
“You’re not an idiot,” Sally tells him.  
“I’m never too sure.”  
“You’re a doctor!” and she realizes she's being jollied. Like doctors will do.  
“I am," he admits. "Although mostly these days I just handle wounded egos.”  
Her face turns. John Watson does not have a place on her list of Certified Bad People. Which doesn’t mean she’s okay with being chastised. “It’s not about my ego. What I have against Sherlock, it’s not about not being smarter than him.”  
Whoops. “I know.”  
“It’s easy to say it, and it’s unfair.”  
Screwed that one up. “I know.” John gets the peeled gel into its container, and snaps on the seal. Rocks back on his heels. She's just proving it, actually. It is about everyone’s ego. Even Sally’s. Maybe it’s not about being smart, but it is about something that’s been taken from her about how police work should be done. It’s not the preening monster she minds so much as the rest of them around him. Take Sherlock away for good and Sally will still be wounded by having seen them all, the shapes they've contorted into, to contribute to the happiness of what is, honestly, a kind of demon-child. Even himself, John Watson. She's not wrong, but - the life of a soldier - he's not on her side. Enemy territory, time to retreat. She won’t understand how it’s not personal, but he reminds himself - she’s not a soldier, or a doctor. She’s a cop. 

John stands, gets the kit. “You should know, Sergeant Donovan, the girl from last night. When she got breathing on her own.”  
“Yeah.”  
She did the right thing, one drowning girl to another. “She asked us to thank you.”


End file.
